By Ayomide Otitoju
President Donald Trump announced on Saturday that American oil companies would be allowed to enter Venezuela to exploit the country’s vast crude reserves following the US military’s seizure of President Nicolás Maduro.
US forces carried out early-morning air strikes on Caracas before capturing Maduro and his wife, who were flown to New York to face drug-trafficking and weapons charges. Speaking at a news conference in Florida, Trump said, “We’re going to have our very large United States oil companies… go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure, the oil infrastructure, and start making money for the country.”
Trump clarified that the US embargo on Venezuelan oil “remains in full effect.” Washington first imposed economic sanctions on Venezuela in 2017 and expanded them to oil exports in 2019.
Venezuela produces just under one million barrels of crude per day, according to OPEC, with most sold on the black market at discounted rates. Trump claimed the country’s oil revenues fund “drug terrorism, human trafficking, murder, and kidnapping.”
During his second term in 2025, Trump ended licenses that had allowed multinational oil companies to operate in Venezuela under sanctions, leaving Chevron as the only US firm with an exemption. Chevron currently operates four oil fields in partnership with state-owned PDVSA.
Venezuela holds roughly 17 percent of the world’s oil reserves, according to the International Energy Agency, but years of mismanagement and corruption have limited its production. The country’s crude is mostly lower-quality heavy oil, suitable for diesel or asphalt rather than gasoline, which US Gulf Coast refineries are equipped to process.
Analysts note that the move is driven more by political strategy than energy needs. “The United States is doing just fine without Venezuelan oil,” said Stephen Schork of the Schork Group.
